And time goes quicker
by F-ontiptoes
Summary: Vignettes, glimpses ...just brief moments of mindset. Multiple pairings, multiple characters. I do not own TVD, its characters, places, storylines etc. I don't plan on profiting from this either.
1. Stefan(Elena) 1

It starts with a girl.

(It will end with a girl and she will be the same, but not really.)

In-between there's his brother, there's blood, there's tears, there's her laugh vibrating against the slope of his shoulder.

Once upon a time he used to count days. He used to count those that made him forget. He used to count those that he felt like himself. He's stopped at some point. It's better not expect anything, to be pleasantly surprised.

Sometimes he feels like he's older than he is and sometimes he feels like he's done this before and then there's a voice at the back of his mind and singsongs a name.

_(Katherine)_

A circle has no end.

/


	2. KatherineElijah 1

"Oh how far the mighty have fallen."

Katherine sighs exasperatedly and turns her back to the window. She halfway expects him to look smug but then again he's Elijah and he's British and those are particularly synonyms. She musters a smile and puts her hands to her hips, tilting her head sideways.

"Came all the way from New Orleans just to gloat?" It's a false accusation and she knows that, but then again the flicker of hurt on his face still doesn't make up for him leaving her behind. "Doesn't sound very you."

He pushes himself off the doorway, tucking his hands into the pockets off his grey suit. "You're only insulting yourself. We both know you know better."

She takes an involuntary step backwards as he takes one towards her. She looks anywhere but at him, her eyes flickering across the room. The silence unnerves her. "So?"

He smiles slightly, tipping his chin down. "Humanity suits you well, Katerina."

She snorts, folding her arms at her chest. "You and I have a very different understanding of those matters then."

Elijah sighs heavily, lays one of his hands across the backrest of the wingchair closest to him. "I hoped you would adapt better, after everything you had to adapt to in the past."

She shifts her weight on her left leg, getting more distance between them. "This is not a situation I want to get used to. I refuse. This…" she laughs dryly and throws her arms up. "…is a mistake to be unmade."

"I doubt dear Elena thinks the same way." He casts his eyes to the floor than up at her face again. "Would you like to undo it?"

Her eyes widen slightly at the notion and for the first time she really starts thinking about that. It's a chance, but it's a cruel chance. At the end all chances are.

"What do you think?" she says, juts her chin up.

He smirks, keeps his distance just as she keeps hers. Sometimes she thinks there should be more space between them.

_(Sometimes she thinks there should be none at all.)_


	3. Katherine 1

Katherine laughs and it feels like ashes in her mouth.

Katherine smirks and it feels taut and plastered.

Katherine walks and lives and breathes and feels like a shell of herself. Katherine despises Elena for all the wrong reasons.

(But they're also right)

She hates because she knows how to. She knew how to love once and she knows how to be loved, but that's not the same.

A lifetime ago she loved Stefan, the same lifetime ago Damon loved her and oh, how she adored the both of them.

Stefan and his forever reason behind everything, Stefan and his guarded desires for everything he didn't understand. Curiosity killed the cat.

(Stefan who never drank the vervain infused tea his father tried to make them drink.)

Damon with his pleading eyes, Damon with his headless devotion. Damon with the milkmaid's blood trickling down his jaw.

(Damon whom she never had to ask twice for anything.)

Katherine runs, Katherine endures. Katherine never backs down. Never.

It takes more than Klaus and his family of ancient vampires to take her down.

(It takes more than Elijah for her to settle down.)


	4. Elena 1

Elena was brought up in the suburbs. She was brought up to kind, gentle, loving, caring , cautious, diligent and a million other things.

She was brought up in a house with a front porch and a picket fence. She was brought up with homemade ginger iced tea and an aunt who laughed more than anybody Elena would every meet.

Nobody ever prepared her for a car crash. Nobody ever prepared her for the feeling of her stopping short in her chest.

Time is a cruel fate to endure and time is even crueller in Mystic Falls. There's Stefan and he listens and he understands and for a split second things seem to get better , but then again they always get better before they get worse.

The following years are worse than anything has ever been, than anything Elena could've dreamed up. There are nightmares lurking behind every corner.

Elena loses more people than she gains and in the end she loses those too. Everything feels like a blur. She feels like she can't do anything but watch them bleed; watch them die for her sake. She'd willingly give her life for any of them.

_(Jenna, John, Ric, Jeremy again and again ) _

Afterwards everybody is just a name on a gravestone and Elena is the last one putting flowers in their vases.


End file.
